Wearable computing was just one of the predictions made by the industry’s leading tech enthusiasts in a forthcoming future technology feature for MPA.

In the world of tomorrow, you won’t even have to reach into your pocket to access crucial client data – instead you could just glance at your wrist. Whilst many brokers are still figuring out how to use their smartphones, “wearable technology is just around the corner” according to PLAN CEO Phil Quin-Conroy. Alongside Greg Lees of Connective and Tony Carn of NextGen.Net, Quin-Conroy highlighted a number of technological developments which had already “revolutionised business” and where “just the tip of the iceberg.”

If having your office strapped to your arm for the whole day doesn’t appeal, you might want consider how you could use biometric signing. According to Lees, Director of aggregator Connective, “everyone will have a personal data vault that will contain everything a lender needs to approve their loan. My salary data, my tax returns, data from my credit card provider and lender: it will all be stored in one place.” Biometric technology, he argues, could help combat fraud and help speed up transactions.

More immediate, if somewhat worrying, was the Tony Carn’s prediction that “machines will talk to machines”. The sales director of IT firm NextGen.Net wasn’t warning of some I Robot-style computer takeover, but instead pointing out that better connectivity could save brokers time manually transferring data from one system from another.

Read other forward-looking predictions, and more practical tips to get ahead of the competition, in our full-length feature on technology in MPA 14.9, hitting desks next week.